


The Political Pundit Fight Song

by Peapods



Category: Pundit RPF
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-30
Updated: 2010-01-30
Packaged: 2017-10-06 21:00:17
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,406
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/57695
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Peapods/pseuds/Peapods
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Someone suggested that a contest of eating cocktail garnishes would be the perfect competition for an award winning quarterback and the smartest woman on television.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Political Pundit Fight Song

**Author's Note:**

> For talk_bingo: "colleagues"

Rachel was not entirely certain how she had arrived at this moment. She _was_ certain large amounts of Stoli had been involved. But, nevertheless, there she sat at a very crowded bar, filled with equally drunk persons as she and Peyton Manning stared down several bowls full of cocktail garnishes.

"I can't believe I'm doing this," she said.

"I'm just defendin' my honor," he told her, accent thick after more beers than she could accurately keep count of at this point in the drinking.

"I don't know why I let him talk me into these things," she grumbled.

"He's very persuasive?"

"He's a bully," Rachel decided with an emphatic nod of her head. "You don't work with him, you don't know."

"I hate to tell ya this, Rachel, but I've watched your shows. You adore each other," his grin is dorky and genuine.

"Quite possibly," she siad, reluctantly. "Doesn't mean he's not a big bully."

"He just wants to show you off. I've done it to Eli before. He'll never forgive me for that hot wings incident. He couldn't feel his tongue for three days."

"A drinking contest, I would understand--"

"You would fall down drunk under the table before I'd hit shit-faced in a contest with me," he told her, laughing.

"Quite possibly, as you are a very large man, however not knowing what kind of drinking you do, it is possible I could last longer than you think. Be that as it may, I do not understand how we got from 'Rachel is the smartest person in the room' to 'Rachel could totally eat more cocktail garnishes than you'."

As it turned out, when Keith yelled "GO!" and they started devouring maraschino cherries, lemons, limes, and olives, and oranges, there was a reason they were called "garnishes." Rachel ordered a straight vodka, no you had better make that a double, and washed each sickly sweet cherry, overly mushy olive, and puny lime down with a swig of her drink.

Peyton didn't even try to mix with something that made sense and kept tossing back beer like water.

"You know, there's a reason I always take the lime off the edge of the glass. Why the fuck do I want fruit in my alcohol?" she asked, popping another olive in her mouth. Fruits and things were really not meant to be drunk food. The least they could have done was deep-fried everything.

"Beats the hell outta me. Only one use I can see and they don't serve jungle juice in the bars, 'less Tennessee wins a bowl game, but I can't tell ya which bar that is. Secret," Peyton told her, mouth full of artificially red cherries.

"You know, I've never before wished I was Southern before, but perhaps now is the time to start."

"You'd have a much better idea about whether you'd be able to beat me in a drinking contest, let's put it that way."

The crowd around them was mostly uninterested in garnishes, but cheered as they each dwindled to only a few fruits. Keith stood at Rachel's side quietly chanting her name, raising his voice to get the others involved. Plenty of Colts fans, and a few UT fans to boot, came to Peyton's defense. The bar was getting louder as they both finished in what looked like a tie.

"Tie breaker! Finish your drinks. GO!" Keith yelled and Rachel easily won by tipping the rest of her vodka into her mouth while Peyton had to pound half a beer.

"Unfair advantage," he called after the furor had died down.

"Sure, but then that's what you get for drinking your sissy beer."

"You didn't even know the Blue Moon was a common beer."

"Because beer usually smells like feet and cannot be made in a shaker," Rachel said, her logic making perfect sense to her. She wouldn't be deterred by the fact that she had been known to drink Budweiser in her time.

"Your point is taken," Peyton said before his attention wandered to somewhere behind her shoulder. She blinked, trying to get rid of the rounded edges of her vision and cocked her head over her shoulder.

"Anderson, you have a very attractive, athletic man staring at you," she said. Out loud, though that wasn't her original intention. She turned back to find Peyton's face bright red with more than the effect of a couple(dozen?) beers. She laughed and wrangled a hand around Anderson's bicep and pulled him to standing between them. He was already flushed with however much he'd had to drink and was smiling.

"Some reason I'm being manhandled here?" he asked.

"Peyton wanted to meet you," Rachel lied.

Anderson turned to the football player and held out a hand. "Hi, pro football, right?"

"Yeah, Indianapolis Colts," he said, shaking hands firmly.

"I'm afraid I know about as much about football as I do about any other sport that doesn't involve oars and water, which is to say 'not much'," Anderson said, and Rachel smiled because they totally weren't paying attention to her anymore. She recognized the starry glaze in Peyton's eyes and turned to the bar to order another drink, shaking her head at _that_ unlikely match.

"Don't you think you've had enough?" Keith asked, coming up to her.

"No," she said, frankly, "I have plenty of fruit to soak up the liquor anyway."

"Is... Peyton Manning flirting with Anderson Cooper or did I just have a small stroke?"

"With you? Could go either way," she shrugged. "Man, these are some seriously good sidecars. I may need to get this bartender's number."

"The bartender is a man," Keith pointed out.

"I didn't mean that in the dirty way," she said scornfully, "I meant that in the hobbyist bartender way. I will have you know I have plenty of men's numbers in my phone."

"None of whom you've seen naked, I'm sure," he said.

"Well," she shrugged.

"Oh ho! Really, Dr. Maddow?"

"I was a teenager once, you know."

"And those people still have your number? Or vice versa?"

"Sure," she said, smiling brightly, sipping her drink.

Keith narrowed his eyes, "I have a feeling this is either something I really want to know and will regret knowing or something I really don't want to know and you'll tell me just to freak me out."

She sat there for a moment trying to puzzle out that sentence before just saying, "Yes," with a decisive nod of her head.

"You're sloshed."

"Quite probably."

She heard singing and laughing and turned back to the Odd Couple. Peyton was singing something vaguely familiar and Anderson seemed to be trying to follow him, laughing with each mess up.

"You'll sing, but not dance?" she asked the anchor.

"Peyton insists it's imperative for me to know this, I've no real desire to contradict someone who could possibly throw me fifty yards."

"So, you figured out he's the quarterback?"

"That what they call the thrower?"

Both Peyton, and Keith who had joined the circle, winced, before the former started laughing, "We'll make you a football fan yet, Andy."

Rachel raised an eyebrow, already dwindled to Andy, was it?

"Now, Andy, it's really not that hard," Peyton took a breath and started singing, and very loudly now, "_Rocky Top, you'll always be, home sweet home to me, good ole Rocky Top, WOO, Rocky Top, Tennessee_."

Apparently, the whole bar, or at least the loudest portion of it, knew the song quite well and began singing as well. Peyton had an arm wrapped around Anderson's shoulder and was encouraging him to sing along. Keith, looking bewildered, sang as well, eyes caught, mesmerized by the sight of one of two three-time NFL MVP winners hitting on Anderson Cooper. They went through the verses, some people only joining in at the chorus, and drowned out the bar jukebox and TVs.

Rachel joined in, singing loudly and proudly off-key. She couldn't recall how she'd learned the words the first time, it was probably something she'd picked up from a Southern girlfriend or something.

They all ended on a large "woo!" and Rachel was reaching for her drink before the cheers had died down.

"You know the words to "Rocky Top"?" Keith asked, accepting a glass of something amber and strong smelling from the bartender.

"Keith, some of the things I know would absolutely stun you," she said, words slurring a little.

"Of that, I've no doubt, Rachel."


End file.
